Markets continue to trade weak in early noon session

Indian equity benchmarks continued to trade weak in the early noon session on the back of unabated capital outflows by foreign funds and a weak trend in other Asian markets, following overnight losses in the US equities amid a retreat in commodity-linked stocks due to weaker oil prices. Besides, renewed concerns over passing of key reform bills like GST too dampened sentiments. Traders were seen piling up position in IT stocks, while selling was witnessed in Metal, Realty, Auto, Oil & Gas and Capital Goods sector stocks. At present, both sensex and Nifty were trading below their crucial 25,250 and 7,700 levels respectively. 

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in red, as commodity prices languished in a sign of uncertainty about world growth prospects. Back home, the broader markets were underperforming the larger peers with BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices trading down by 1.11% and 1.63%, respectively. The market breadth on BSE was negative, out of 2511 stocks traded, 485 stocks advanced, while 1892 stocks declined on the BSE. In scrip specific development, share of Electrosteel Steels was trading higher over 6.11% after a consortium of lenders approved part conversion of the company's debt into equity shares under the debt restructuring package.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 25208.95, down by 101.38 points or 0.40% after trading in a range of 25165.16 and 25316.95. There were 8 stocks advancing against 22 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap index was down by 1.06%, while Small cap index down by 1.57%.

The lone gaining sectoral indices on the BSE was IT up by 0.06%, while Metal down by 1.63%, Realty down by 1.34%, Auto down by 0.90%, Oil & Gas down by 0.77%, Capital Goods down by 0.67% were the losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were BHEL up by 2.34%, TCS up by 1.07%, ITC up by 0.75%, Wipro up by 0.66% and Hindustan Unilever up by 0.59%. On the flip side, Vedanta down by 2.93%, Bharti Airtel down by 2.30%, Tata Steel down by 1.98%, Dr. Reddys Lab down by 1.85% and Axis Bank down by 1.78% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, India’s computer services and ITES/BPO services (excluding commercial presence) export during 2014-15 surged by 14.8 per cent to $82 billion (Rs 5.01 lakh crore) over the previous year. According to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in it’s a 'Survey on Computer Software & Information Technology Enabled Services Exports: 2014-15' said that Exports of ‘computer services’ and ‘ITES/BPO services’ contributed 72.0 per cent and 28.0 per cent, respectively, of the total software services exports.

As per the RBI survey, USA & Canada continued as the major destination and accounted for nearly 60 per cent in total export of software services during 2014-15. Europe had nearly 25 per cent share, of which UK accounted for almost half. US Dollar was the invoice currency for around three-fourths of the software exports followed by Pound Sterling and Euro.

Further, the share of the public company in software services exports were about 55.6% in the financial year 2014-15 compared to 63.65 in the 2013-14 year. On the other hand, the share of the private companies in software services exports grew to 43.1% in 2014-15 against 36% the year ago. Moreover, off-site mode accounted for 80 per cent of the software export in 2014-15, while on-site mode accounted for the remaining 20 per cent.

In the year 2014-15, Software exports by foreign affiliates stood at  Rs 841.7 billion ($13.8 billion) and total export of software services by India, including the services delivered by foreign affiliates established abroad, stood at Rs 5,855.7 billion ($95.8 billion). USA had the major share in total software business by foreign affiliates by 71.5% followed by UK at 21%.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 7667.20, down by 34.50 points or 0.45% after trading in a range of 7653.20 and 7702.85. There were 9 stocks advancing against 41 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were BHEL up by 2.28%, TCS up by 1.16%, Wipro up by 1.04%, ITC up by 0.97% and Tech Mahindra up by 0.84%. On the flip side, Vedanta down by 3.04%, Idea Cellular down by 2.33%, Bharti Airtel down by 2.31%, Ultratech Cement down by 2.14% and Ambuja Cement down by 2.13% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in red, Nikkei 225 decreased 177.25 points or 0.91% to 19,315.35, Taiwan Weighted decreased 114.24 points or 1.37% to 8,229.62, Hang Seng decreased 97.87 points or 0.45% to 21,807.26, Jakarta Composite decreased 57.21 points or 1.27% to 4,464.18, Shanghai Composite decreased 4.2 points or 0.12% to 3,465.87 and  FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI decreased 4.06 points or 0.24% to 1,665.18, while KOSPI Index increased 0.17 points or 0.01% to 1,949.21.